In the eight-minute recorded message in Hausa-language message, Shekau rebuffed claims by Chad’s President Idriss Deby that he had been replaced and went on to call Deby a “hypocrite” and a “tyrant”.
“It is indeed all over the global media of infidels that I am dead or that I am sick and incapacitated and have lost influence in the affairs of religion,” Shekau said in the recording released on social media.
“It should be understood that this is false. This is indeed a lie. If it were true, my voice wouldn’t have been heard, now that I am speaking.”
President Deby had declared on August 12 that efforts by the Joint Task Force against Boko Haram jihadists had succeeded in “weakening” the group and would be wrapped up “by the end of the year”.
President Deby went on to tell reporters in Chad’s capital N’Djamena that Shekau no longer leads Boko Haram and that his successor, named as Mahamat Daoud, was open to talks with the Nigerian government.
Gratitude be to Allah and with his help, I have not disappeared. I am still alive and I am not dead. And I will not die until my time appointed by Allah is up,” Shekau said in the message.The SITE Intelligence Group verified the authenticity of the message, and an AFP correspondent with extensive experience of reporting Boko Haram said it exactly resembled Shekau’s voice in previous recordings.
Shekau’s prolonged absence had led to insinuations about his death by security experts and the emergence of Mahamat Daoud, one of the early followers of Yusuf Taliban, the extra-judicially murdered founder of the sect in a new video added futher fuel to the rumor.
